Tag Archives: Despair

After months of putting-off, and one re-booking, I was really looking forward to my appointment with the kinesiologist (Alex) that came so highly recommended. As usual, I was going to be far too early so I stopped at a local convenience store to buy a magazine.

I didn’t have a fixed idea about what this lady was going to be able to do for me, except that I wanted to try something new, something that may help unlock certain problem areas in my life and allow me to move forward.

Well, move I did, but not forward.

I finished paying for my thick, glossy copy of Vogue and headed out of the shop…..and then it got me! As I lay on the floor, reeling from both shock and pain, with kind people gathering round, offering many helping hands, a man stood up with something in his hand.

“There you are love. You slipped on this,” as he proffered the remains of a grape.

I hate grapes. I always have. Good for your health? I don’t bloody think so.

With voices asking for the manager to call an ambulance, I sat there wondering at the irony of it all. Here I am, attempting to shed feelings of angst, stress, fear and anger, to allow my life to progress in a positive direction and I wind up sprawled on a floor, my knee and hip throbbing, hoping I can manage to drive my car home. If there was a meter capable of measuring my stress level at that moment I think it would have exploded.

Could I possibly have sub-consciously tried to prevent myself getting to the appointment? Self-sabotage? Me?

I couldn’t accept that so, with the help of two very kind men, I hobbled out to my car and drove to see Alex.

It was everything I had hoped for. She was wonderful; kind and caring and I happily arranged for my next appointment.

But the thing is, I want this change, more than anything and not even a grape is going to stand in my way.

I was lying in bed, thinking back over the first eight months of this year……and wow, how things have changed. The problems I had this time last year are as nothing now beside the events that came after; the dark and dismal summer seeming like a reflection of things going on around me.

It has been life-changing, but, as with most “big things”, good can come out of the ashes. CAN.

Because, as with most things, it’s about choice isn’t it?

I was talking to one of my wonderful friends last night and she told me about a “mantra” she has started using that has helped her enormously, in fact “freeing” her to enjoy where she is here and now.

” I am here, NOT because I need to be, but because I want to be.”

I watched her face as she told me about it and she is right. She looks happier, more empowered and certainly more in charge of her own destiny than I have seen her, possibly ever.

So Justice Lowell Goddard has taken her seat at the “Inquiry Into Child Sex Abuse”,(CSA Inquiry) and at long last. Although there will be annual interim reports they do not expect to finish before 2020. The details, the reports, the appointments, it goes on and on; it is a huge undertaking, but if it results in a system that ensures the protection of our children, then so be it.

If.

But what happens now? What happens in the meantime?

This must all seem pie-in-the-sky to the kids suffering at the hands of abusers right now, with no sign of a safe haven. Charities try to pick up the slack, but when you bear in mind that out of approximately 4500 calls made to ChildLine every day only 2500 get answered due to lack of funding, then surely the government owes it to our children to pick up the tab for the shortfall.

Can we stand by and allow a child, who has worked up the courage to call for help, to go unheard? Isn’t that the most basic ask of anyone wronged; to be heard?

I am not trying to detract from the need for or the potential of this CSA Inquiry, but 2020 is a long way away for too many.

I have read so many self-help books, listened to so many experts and attended so many seminars, all aimed at helping us give up the struggle, the stress and the negative thoughts and behaviour that marks our lives.

And I get it! Honestly, I do. Let’s face it, the vast majority of it is plain, good old common sense.

But, what it is NOT, is easy; hence the enormous quantity and re-hashing of similar information.

But, no-body said it would, or should, be.

What it is, is worth it.

Each time I hand over a particular stressor to my life’s path, I gain a relief and sense of peace I would not swap for any amount of money or possession.

I am where I am supposed to be, for whatever reason, and I will find happiness here and now.

I have lived with more stuff, more money, more ego, more fear, more stress.

Giving up the fear of losing something you never “owned” in the first place is liberating, and underlines that well-known saying,

But funnily enough this is not about him. It’s about the everyday people who made me start writing this blog in the first place and some who, in the last twenty-four hours, came back into my life and reminded me of the people that made me want to write..

I want to tell you about SBM. (She’ll know who she is)

I met her in hospital. My daughter was very sick and I was spending a lot of time just sitting at her bedside, feeling as much use as a chocolate teapot and thinking, ” Why my girl, why her”.

The nurse asked me to leave as visiting was long over. Reluctantly I stood up just as a voice called over, “Don’t worry about her. I’ll watch over her for you. She’ll be okay.”

I looked across to a bed and a woman who was far from well, very far.She had more tubes and monitors around her than you could shake a stick at. She could see the doubt in my face.

” I can call a nurse if she needs one, don’t worry, and I will watch her for you.”

I believed she would and I left with more comfort than I had dared hope for.

Over the following week I got to know SBM and some of her wonderful family; all very ordinary folk, but all coping with a high level of ongoing, grinding stress that left me breathless. And how they coped?

With laughter, generosity of spirit and an open, embracing love for others. This woman is no shrinking violet and has a sense of humour that could raise a laugh in an empty room. Many times I would have been begging her to stop, my sides aching and the tears running down my face, I was laughing so much.

The thing is, if you heard her story, if you understood her circumstances and the awful loss she has suffered and ill-health she endures, you could forgive her for wanting to lock herself away and wallow in self-pity. But not a bit of it!

She raises money for charities ( having her head shaved for one when sitting upright even hurt), comforts others in times of stress and for me, well, when I couldn’t be at my daughters bedside she was, and I knew it. I will never be able to repay that peace of mind.

And there are others like SBM out there, quietly giving out such positive energy to those around them and, in my eyes, earning the title of “Hero”.

And here she goes again, popping up in my “Inbox” last night, reminding me what life, love and happinesss should be about.

As one bad news story piles on top of another, from every corner of the world, it is easy to give into despair for plight of human-kind.

After listening to the reports of the mass shooting in Tunisia something starts to pierce my shock and horror at this latest demonstration of man’s ability to inflict murder and mayhem on their fellow-man.

The constant reference to “Brits among the dead”, “?? British dead out of 37”; STOP , please!

Of course I understand that for a locally reporting news organisation company the local take is important, but for news companies reporting world-wide can we accept that each one of those 37 people counts. Each one had their own back story, family, friends and hopes and dreams; part of which was getting away for a while to lie on a beach and forget the stresses of life.

Anyone I speak to is aware these random acts of terrorism can happen anywhere, anytime. It is a global issue, affecting every race and religion ( or lack of), every sexual orientation and every age group.

How many times have you heard this? Does it usually spring up at the very moment someone is about to attempt to justify the unjustifiable?

Mmm, me too.

“It’s only natural,” is as bogus an excuse for bad behaviour as it is in the labelling of a lot of snacks and convenience foods. In a civilised society we are supposed to temper our “natural” inclinations, to take into account the feelings of others and the impact of our actions on our environment.

Pity then our children trying to make sense of a world where the media makes much of those that shout loudest, stomp on the weak and celebrate/revere the rude, crude and thoroughly undignified.

I feel bombarded by media showing the monetary success this kind of celebrity can bring and, even at my age, have problems processing the quantity and quality of the information, so how on earth can we expect young people to make sense of it, or to be able to filter the myth from the reality.

Unfortunately, and very sadly for all of us, when they try to emulate their modern-day role-models aren’t they then,

I have also gone over how I did not “get it”, for years, that you need to start with the second part of this before you can understand loving others.

The veracity and truth of this comes back to me so many times, that, each time it does I feel I get a better understanding than that first light-bulb moment.

Friends are wonderful and I am very blessed with mine, but until you learn to listen and respect your inner voice, your inner self, you will continue looking for answers to your problems from others. And no-one can fulfill that role, can know what is truly best for you, better than you.

The act of talking an issue over with a friend is great; quite often allowing you to hear the solution and the sense of it. It can provide a clarity and a comfort that comes with sharing and their loving support.But, ultimately, the answer was within your grasp all the time.

In being your own best friend you need the honesty that comes with this kind of relationship and also the same generosity of spirit you would show to that friend when needed.

Finding peace in being alone should not isolate you, but provide you with a strength of self-awareness and allows you to be a better friend to those you love.

My “issues” with my mother were brought sharply into focus when I found myself watching a particular episode of “The Sopranos”, the one where Tony attempts to suffocate his mother, Livia. Before I knew it I was cheering him on, feeling all of his pent-up hurt, frustration, anger and bitterness as it shut out everything else his conscious self had told him for years; how he should love, care for and respect this woman who had brought him into the world, indeed, given him life.

I looked at “Livia’s” face and saw my own mother.

But instead of feeling shame at my true feelings towards her I acknowledged them and the long path that led to this conclusion. I do not love my mother. I can’t.

Shame has been replaced now with acceptance, albeit an acceptance tinged with real sadness.

Mothers do not give their children life, nature does that. Our children’s’ lives are not our property, not ours to trash as and when the stress of life gets too much. We are merely the guardians, the caretakers (literally) until they can safely take control of their own destinies.

I am so far from being the perfect mother, or even the mother I had hoped to be, but perfection is not what being a parent is about.

For me it’s about loving my kids through all those bad times as well as good, with that same ferocious and undying love I felt the first moment I saw each of them. It’s about putting your arms around them when you really feel like kicking their ass.

And, most importantly, it is about those children growing up knowing, without question at all, that they are loved and lovable.

The reasons for where I am to-day in my relationship with my mother are many and painful, from my parents eventual divorce after years of hell for all involved, to her now obvious mental health problems, but in the end all of this is irrelevant.

I at least understand it is not my fault! It’s just what it is and that is all.

I have no magic answer for how I progress this. It’s just a day at a time.

Up until now I couldn’t really have given two hoots for the whole “Clarkson” debacle, viewing it as just another in the long list of crap surrounding both this programme and this man.

Now, if I never hear the name of this snivelling excuse of a human being again I will be very relieved!

In his Sunday article he talks about how he had a “cancer scare” going on at the same time as he punched one of his colleagues, only getting the all-clear two days later, and also talks about the awful strain he has been under since the breakdown of his marriage. Oh sorry, he does acknowledge that there are others out there who are suffering too and are handling it better than he did. Ahhhh.

Boo-bloody-hoo you pathetic individual! Have you actually no dignity at all? Will you ever learn to just “Shut Up”??

I know people whose level of suffering and stress leaves me breathless, and yet they never seek sympathy or pity, or to excuse appalling behaviour because of it. They may seek empathy, but are usually far more likely to reach out in support of others.

It was a TV show! You have made squillions from it and probably never need to work again! Build a bridge, you asshole and GTF over it!